A painr of antlers found in Laos in 1991 were confirmed to be Schomburgk's Deer! This was just mentioned by @Sarus Crane in the gallery and thought it needed its own thread: Scientists find 28-year-old antlers in Laos belonging to deer species believed extinct in the 1930s | Daily Mail Online
That was still 28 years ago, though. The WCS found and filmed Kouprey in the wild not too much earlier than that but there's still little chance that's around today. It'd be great if either species survived, but the region they live(d) in has seen a lot of damage over the past 30 years... ~Thylo
Whereas noteworthy to say the least, it is a far cry from its continued survival. BTW: tigers were lost from Laos 10 years ago and leopards even longer so. So, illegal wildlife poaching has had its course for many species already!
Often small populations of a species that has been officially declared to be extinct, but which is actually just functionally/ ecologically extinct, continue to linger on for decades in the wild. Typically this persistance might just be a handful of individuals and they may go unnoticed due to difficulties of conservationists conducting fieldwork in more accessible areas. For example , I have read that there is some fairly substantial and notable evidence that some thylacines may have survived in the more remote regions of Tasmania right up until the 50's and 60's. However, the odds that there are any thylacine still existing in the wild today are beyond negligible and despite all of the "sightings" that occur every year the chances that these are genuine are highly unlikely. There is typically a much higher incidence and likelihood of smaller "lazarus species" being rediscovered such as small mammals , birds, amphibians , reptiles and insects than large mammals. These kind of things are sort of normal and the rediscovery of species originally recorded by some intrepid Victorian naturalist but that have "disappeared" for over a century literally happen every year. I think its more probable , particularly in consideration of the levels of poaching and deforestation in Laos and the fact that these antlers were found almost 30 years ago, that the Schomburgk's Deer is extinct. But interesting article and fingers crossed that there are some still out there.
For anyone that doesn't want to feed the Daily Mail: Evidence suggests rare deer lived 50 years beyond ‘extinction’
The chances of anything coming from Laos are a million to one (they said). I can't see current survival there in any way likely. Laos is being stripped clean of wildlife, even more so than Vietnam. Obviously there is still some wildlife left there of the larger sort, but the odds are distinctly against Schomburgk's Deer survival. Really interesting development, though, if the antlers are indeed that recent.